Peter Brantley is the director of strategic technology for academic information systems at the University of California, one of the premier libraries that have entered into a relationship with Google to digitize their holdings.Here is some of what he had to say about the initiative:-it was mistake-The goal is undeniably grand, and good.The means have left much to be desired.-We poisoned our hand before we played it-For the love of selfish confidence, we spoke neither our fortune nor our misgivings with our neighbors or our friends-In our selfishness, and wrapped in the fears we were given, we re-wrote and redefined...
Communist Party Archive Goes To NYU
NYT reports that the papers of the American Communist Party have landed at NYU.Michael Nash, the director of New York University’s Tamiment Library, will announce the donation on Friday.The collection consists of 20,000 items and contains decades of party history including founding documents, secret code words, letters, smuggled directives from Moscow, photographs and as you can imagine a lots of Soviet memorabilia.Though its heyday was the 1930's the party began in 1919 as a mostly underground organization and lasted until the beginning of the cold war.Labor unions and the rights of the working class. Two elements the success of this...
Books by Prescription
bib·lio·ther·a·py - the use of reading materials for help in solving personal problems or for psychiatric therapy; also : the reading materials so used.The Irish Medical Times reports that "A scheme to promote bibliotherapy as a form of medication has been launched in Ireland"Doctors and other mental health professionals will now have the option of "prescribing high quality self-help books to people with mild or moderate psychological problems."The Dublin public library system plays a major role in the process. The patient goes to one of the participating libraries and "hand their prescription in over the library counter and then receive...
The "No Information Left Behind" Act
With the debate over the digitization of our cultural heritage in full swing it's time to propose the "No Information Left Behind" Act.With lack of funding being the biggest hurdle many institutions face we need to get creative in coming up with ways to fund these endeavors. Our government must get more involved. We simply cannot leave it to the private sector. There are too many variables and potential pitfalls with having the digital rights of so many cultural artifacts in the hands of private companies. They may mean well now but things can change in a hurry in the...
The Fruits of Libraries
"I went down to the Modesto Library and inquired of the librarian if she had any books on winemaking. And with her help, I looked through the library and there were none. After all, this was just on repeal of Prohibition, and it wasn't a very popular subject. Then she thought, and "Well," she said, "down in the basement there's a stack of pamphlets. There might be some there from before Prohibition."And she said, "Why don't you go down there and see if there are any?" I did go down in the basement and went through an enormous stack of...